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Thank you all! The cooking oil used here is 100% rapeseed oil, probably the most commonly used and by far the cheapest cooking oil here in Finland. I also used around 10% of coconut oil to make bars a bit harder, and 8% castor oil to increase lather which tends to be quite low in 100% rapeseed...

Ah sorry, forgot to mention, it's Spirulina powder :) Never seem to get very even color with it, but then again, I think the graininess isn't a big issue.

Long time no soap! I finally found time to make a quick batch. I actually decided to make this one when I was wondering what to do with all the used cooking oil I used for deep-fried doughnuts on the 1st of May. I hate to throw anything usable away, so... :D The oil itself smelled...

I've noticed that there's an unpleasant smell in the soaps that still have not cured enough. That smell is quite overpowering and disgusting after -not during - washing hands with "too fresh" soap. For some reason the smell comes after drying hands and not when handling the soap. I'm not...

Okay, thank you very much! The bars with 15% CB seem to be very nice indeed, creamy and very moisturizing even though the curing isn't fully finished, can't wait to get to actually use them :) I'm a great fan of cocoa butter (as well as shea) so I think I'll continue to use it more than 10% in...

I just realized I've probably been using cocoa butter way "too much" in my CP soaps. Most of the recipes I've found suggest that it should be used around 5-10%, and I've used up to 15%. The recent cocoa soaps are still curing but I've tried them, and I didn't notice anything special about them...

Thank you dieSpinne, it's good to know there's nothing wrong with this batch except cosmetically, as it's been very nice to use. Gentle and pleasant scrub bar is how I'd describe it. If I remember correctly I was very, very careful with the temperatures when I made this batch - it was my very...

I guess I should but it won't help this batch :) Are these stearic spots (I'm assuming these are stearic and not lye, I think I'd notice the difference ;)) harmful in any way? I've almost finished the first bar - without noticing the spots until now - and it didn't do anything funny so I guess...

100g coconut 75g palm 25g shea 50g olive 37g lye 83g water 1tsp cocoa powder SF% was 5, I know it's on a low side, but I guess it should not be a problem? At least it shouldn't cause this if I'm correct... I don't measure temps, maybe I should... :oops:

Okay, now I'm confused again. I've been using my very first well-cured soaps for some time now and I've found some very bright white spots inside them. I think they look a bit like powder. The first thing I came up with was obviously lye, but the spots do not zap nor color paper napkin brown (I...

So here are the results right after cutting. This was done yesterday and by now the color is evenly brown without the greenish area in the middle. I nearly wish it had stayed there, the frame looked so nice... :D So yes, it did turn brown as expected. The color is quite light, much...

Okay, I tried it and the result is in the moulds right now... I added henna to the lye water as planned, I'm still curious if the result would be different if I had added it at some other point. As guessed, it's brown and on top of that, it smells horrible, like fresh henna. I think the smell...

No medical claims will be made since I only make soap for myself :D I think I'll give it a try to see what it'll do. Could it be added to the lye water or should it be added at trace (I'm pretty sure it won't mix evenly then...)? I'm curious if the temp has anything to do with the color it's...

I don't dye my hair with henna anymore and I have a couple of bags of pure henna I don't need anymore. I was wondering if it could be used in CP soap? I thought it might give a nice color if not anything else, though it could also turn brown. Is there any reason it should not be used?

Thanks all! :) The best thing about the jelly bean batch is that it smells great. I can't wait to see how it works later, I'm going to cure it a long time in order to make it a bit harder. SF% is quite a bit higher than usually in my soaps, so it's a bit soft but it seems to turn out fine...

Okay, after these two batches I've learned a lot, AGAIN. Too bad I have to learn everything by making mistakes :lol: But anyway, despite that I think the first one of these is probably the best batch I've made so far. I love the jelly bean scent! First of all, it's not a good idea to swirl...

No idea, I never measure temps :oops: That could be the problem, but I think I won't bother trying that again and will just go back to melting the wax together with oils because it works better for me.

I've used beeswax in most of my batches, and I've always melted them together with the other oils before adding lye. It works just perfect that way and accelerates the trace, which is great for me as I (still, after several batches ;)) mix everything by hand. Today I made a HUUUGE mistake...

Lucky you, I wish we had snow "already", I think it's pretty late by now! ;) Anyway, great soaps and I wish we could be able to smell them too ;)

Thank you SO much everyone, it's so good to hear you like my experiments :D It's always exciting to show something you've done for the first time. I got it from a local distributor here in Finland. Gracefruit is a British company and I'm not sure if they ship worldwide. They have very nice...